Wingapo friends!
This blog builds off of my last post. Feel free to read it i you did not read the last one, but also know that you may be missing some information.
After being lead across the bars following a trail of roses, nothing happened. I found this girl and that was it. No big miraculous signs. No freedom. No crazy revelations. Not even a little bit of peace for this girl. It was not even like we became friends. Since then I have not been able to speak with her. I have managed to wave at her twice. Regardless every morning, God leads me out of the hostel, down the street, and down to this bar. Every morning I walk by and pray over it and her. Several evenings a week, the Lord has me go out and sit at this bar, pray, and try to make eye contact with her. Sometimes she is there. Sometimes she is not.
After about a week of this, I was confused. I kept praying for an opportunity to speak with her and the Lord kept saying, “Not now” and “she’s not ready.”
I kept going and I kept going. Then at the end of last week, I was (once again) sitting in this bar when another one of the girls sat with us after taking our drink order. There was a strong language barrier that prevented conversation past “1 coke” with a lot of hand gestures, but we were able to play connect four. We played for about an hour (most people will play a round or two with us then leave). The next night, when we came back, she about pushed another girl out of the way to sit with us. This time she taught us how to play jackpot (another board-game). Again we played for about an hour.
As we left, the girls with me were talking about how this bar felt so heavy it was hard to sit in it. They kept saying they felt so unwanted and unwelcomed there. As I was listening I realized that, as heavy as it felt, this one girl playing games with us had made a big difference. The fact that there was one person at this bar that was not openly negative toward me being there was a huge and welcome change.
But what about the girl I was sent to pray for? It’s not like she (let’s call her Rose) is any more positively inclined toward me.
This month the Lord has called me to go out into this bar and to see how much he loves Rose. He has shown me that he loves her enough to bring someone halfway around the world, cover Rose is white, cover Rose in roses, and to leave a trail of roses just so that someone could sit and appreciate how much He loves her. Even better, I get to share in that love. As I was sitting at this table praying for her recently, the Lord showed me that when I was in my darkest places He covered me in roses and sent someone to sit and experience how much the Lord loved/s me when I was not able to feel it. He showed me that he had sent people to just pray quietly for me until my heart was ready to search out light again.
This month I do not have an awe-inspiring story about how legions (or even one person) was saved from darkness/illness/slavery/prostitution/addiction/etc. What I do have is a lot of assurance that the Lord loves Rose so much, that if she is even a little like me, one day she will find herself sitting at the table of roses watching and praying for some other person, and learning how the Lord delights in her.
Thank you so much for all the prayers and support this month. This month has been especially hard and all the more rewarding because of it. Tomorrow we start the process of heading to Malaysia. The Wildflower team should be in Georgetown, Malaysia for the month of December. Happy Thanksgiving and Happy Holidays!
